Muddled
by Ivydoll
Summary: Complete. BakuraRyou drabbles at 100 words each. Contains plot.
1. One

**(KAI)** 100 word Bakura/Ryou Drabbles.  
Ryou POV.  
(Update: If you enjoy _Muddled_, you might also enjoy _Muddled 2_, which can be found on my author page.)

* * *

Some rain today. Too much, and the muddles got my jeans. Now I'm without.

Bakura sits on the couch first, I sit on the floor. Television is on. "Sit up here," he says, eyeing my legs, white and crossed.

"Should I?" because he is manic, and smiles at me. Bakura smiles when he thinks. His thoughts are like silver.

"The couch is better. It's softer."

"I'm soft." I will speak… to him.

"You're bony."

"So are you."

"Good state for a couch." So I get on the couch. He is warmer, closer. Not so silver, not so muddled like me.


	2. Two

**2**

* * *

He doesn't like breakfast. I serve it on a tray for him on days like this. He whines and throws my things.

"It's orange juice," I say, and he drinks it because he likes the taste. Vitamin C means nothing to the once dead. He is alive now, but doesn't know what starvation feels like.

"Sit by me, _Yadonushi_," an order.

"Why not ask me to?" I say, sitting by him, leaning my head on his shoulder.

"What if you say no?" Unsettling Bakura.

"I wouldn't." I want him to eat.

"Will you eat?"

"I will."

He feeds me, too.


	3. Three

**3**

* * *

Last day of school. I won't go back, now.

"Why?"

"I don't want to."

Bakura ponders this. "You will survive?"

"Papa will support me. Papa works for millionaires. He doesn't care what I do as long as he can forget."

Bakura is silver in the window- he whispers, "Memories."

Because he has become weaker, now. "Mother. Amane."

"Death doesn't forget," he says, and looks at me almost darkly.

"Don't punish the wicked, _Yami_, let the innocent trial, not us."

"You're too weak." A hiss.

He lets me touch his shoulder. "Papa will support us."

He likes the sound of 'us.'


	4. Four

**4**

* * *

Now he reads. Every newspaper is his play thing. Tapped into me, and my childhood, and now he can learn, but he doesn't care. Only newspapers. Only strangers interest him.

I could leave the journal I don't have on the kitchen table. It would go untouched.

He reads on the couch. It his comfort place. He sleeps there. "Prime minister is arrested," he tells me, "Hayasaka released a new record."

So I smile. And he sometimes smiles, too. When he's thinking… he smiles…

"Tell me about her record, _Yami_," I say, and he will let me braid his hair. Gently.


	5. Five

**5**

* * *

He hugged me today. Kissed my nose. I blushed, and he left for the couch, paisley and soft. "The girl on television did what you do."

"The girl?" I murmur, because his lips were soft, his arms were warm. His eyes were cold.

"Jing Hoi television programming. Nene the schoolgirl blushes when Jing puts his arms around her."

"I'm not a schoolgirl."

"You used to be."

"Why does Jing Hoi put his arms around Nene? Why hug her?"

Bakura looks concerned. He is reviewing what he knows.

"Because he likes her, but can't say so."

"Why does he kiss her?"


	6. Six

**6**

* * *

So it is a mystery. He eats, sleeps, and does not look in my eyes. Silence hangs like a blue curtain, see-through and fluttering. It is not long before he comes after me.

"What are you doing?" So angry is he, he slams the door.

"Writing," I tell him, and forgive him his coldness.

He watches outside, sitting in the other chair. The guest chair.

"Storm," and I look out and he is not lying. Clouds roll again. I am not muddled this time- the muddles _won't _get me.

"I'll save." I do, and walk to him. Then I leave.


	7. Seven

**7**

* * *

Weather channel goes out as the report reaches its middle. More is coming.

I move through darkness, then. Move like Bakura must have, once.

Darkness is all right. I don't want to be alone in it. But it's all right.

He is still sitting in my room. Hours later. His profile and then his eyes in a flash of white, cathartic and blinding. I don't say anything. I don't want him to leave.

"Lay with me, _Yami_," an order. A quiet, plaintive one.

Never so shocked; never so hot in the face. Lower. When he lifts the blankets. And obeys.


	8. Eight

**8**

* * *

A dream wakes me. Bakura holding me. It would never happen; that is how I wake myself. Knowledge of the impossible, and of the wished for.

I won't torture myself like that.

But...

Here we still lay.

Dreams blend. Smooth like thread-less seams, he presses his face to my neck and he does not cry, but I can feel him breathe like a child.

"You're awake," he says, does not whisper in the dark.

"Yes," I return, quietly.

Silence then.

"Do you like the rain?"

He is a child.

"Sometimes," the words slip too softly from my lips.

He laughs.


	9. Nine

**9**

* * *

One last night passes. For weeks he has lain by me. Chaste as a breath across my cheek as I wait for dreams to overtake me once again.

He holds me too tightly now.

Weaker and weaker, we are becoming too frail to hide from one another.

"Please tell me now."

"_Yadonushi_," he mumbles, trying to sleep like a normal person, but failing.

"Why Jing kisses Nene."

He stiffens. I wince.

"Only once," he tries to defend himself.

I look away, no storm outside to distract me, to muddle me.

"Papa is so far away. I need someone close."

"...I-"


	10. Ten

**10**

* * *

The next day, the last, is cold. I sit in my blanket on Bakura's couch, and I cry.

He lets me.

"I don't want to be alone!"

So he yells at me, "The storms are over, I'm still here, aren't I?"

"No..."

Like Jing, he kisses me again. But not softly. Like a possession. Blushing, I want to be like Nene, I want to be loved.

"Stupid _Yadonushi_," he growls, because he has to.

"I love you," crying, "love you like winter."

Muddled. Always _muddled_.

He doesn't seem to mind. He holds me. Tight, tight. "Yes, like winter."

Kisses me.


End file.
